Well there were stories where Jobs had to mediate meetings between Forstall and other execs. If even Jobs has to mediate, you know you're a problem. I wonder if Forstall was thinking about his job safety after Jobs passed.

I don't see any major changes to iOS until version 8. I am sure 7 already has it's outline for release.

Judging by the rumours, Forstall offered very little to Apple, apart from negativity. No company needs employees like that.

Lets not understate what he did for the company. No one is denying that he did poor work as a whole, he did after all oversee development on one of the most advanced mobile OS.

But a few select iOS projects such as Maps and Siri were severely flawed. But additionally, you also cant deny that iOS has become stagnated and more inconsistant. Add that to his fiery personality and his unfavourable design taste (subjective I know), it was just a matter of time before he was going to let go.

Judging by the rumours, Forstall offered very little to Apple, apart from negativity. No company needs employees like that.

Forstall has done a lot for Apple. Remember he's been working for Apple for a long time. Aqua wouldn't have existed in the shape it was released in if it wasn't for him. iOS would have looked nothing like it does today if it wasn't for him. iOS has to a large extent been responsible for the massive success the iPhone has seen.

He hasn't done as much lately though. I do think Apple's timing here seems about right. He seems to have been very skilled in coming up with simple, yet attractive and usable interfaces. But I think he is best suited when it comes to spearheading new projects rather than maintaining them.

I think Apple may have been thinking that they do not need a "Forstall" in the foreseeable future, because Apple now works in the desktop, laptop, tablet, mobile, mp3 player, and TV spaces. They are established in the areas they want to be now. There is still much to do, but these efforts do not involve spearheading entirely new devices, new operating systems. Forstall gave Apple much of their brand identity in the software space, but they have it now. They've seen now what he could give them. Forstall hasn't had much more to give, as seen by the last two years of iOS "development"... It's been more about apps lately than building new platforms, which I think is what Forstall excelled at.

It's now more about maturing the operating systems on their devices, coming up with innovative new features, and staying at the forefront. Given that they may then start to suffer more from the downsides from his assertive team leadership style than the upsides from his innovative ideas on taking the "Apple experience" to new fields, they are better off with restructuring.

Tim: "Please, don't leave. What can possibly be in the way of our (professional) relationship?"
Bob: "Scott Forstall. He will never let us procreate... new innovations."
Tim: "Anything.. Anything for you.."

I like the work Bob has done with Apples hardware, and it was always a pleasure seeing him on the keynotes. He always reminds me of the best Sr engineers at my own company. When your company is built upon product, these people are the bedrock that product & everything else is built up from. I'm sure we've all worked with toxic personalities before, and have come to some understanding of the phrase "life's too short". I don't blame him one bit for pursuing retirement when he did if it was in some part due to interpersonal struggle w/ Forstall.

But I sure am glad to see Cook make the choice he did. Keeping Mansfield, putting Ive firmly charge of complete product design, etc...

I'm actually fairly shocked at how many of the top executives at Apple disliked Forstall. At least now, perhaps we'll start to see iOS change up a little bit.

They may have disliked him for different purposes. How about creating 2/3 of all of Apple's revenue singlehandedly by his iOS division (iphones, ipads, ipods) and making it a most valuable company in the world? How about creating a whole mobile craze, two new revolutionary markets, touch smartphones and touch tablets? Forstall might be a difficult person but he sure he is a true visionary, not less than Steve himself. Having 2/3 of Apple revenue coming form his division, Forstall had a right to be proud of his vision.

However, having said that, at some point he probably made an enemy bigger than Ive and Mansfield: Tim Cook, the CEO.

The reason is that Tim Cook is not a visionary but a brilliant and ruthless executioner. Tim needs a vision to guide and a plan for follow so he can muscle his great execution. He needs visions for both sides of his company: hardware and software. Steve would be able to provide that vision both for Cook and Ive and Forstall and he would be the one to integrate things into a single plan for Cook to go ahead.

With death of Steve Jobs, there was no more integration in a single vision, but two different visions, one is led by Ive, of minimalist and functional design and one of Forstall, built on current iOS, which itself was revolutionary but increasingly autonomous, because probably Forstall operated under principle if it aint broken, don't fix it so he was began producing iterations of earlier iOS without much visible changes. It is visible from the different iOS versions and different iPhone models. There were 3-4 largely distinct, large changes in iOS hardware (iPhones) but only small changes in a iOS design, which means Ive was progressing much faster than Forstall. At some stage the breakup was inevitable and one who is for change, won.

Having one visionary is quite an nightmare; having two is a catastrophe for a company. Tim Cook made his bet and chose Ive's style, because Ive's style is wider; it not only includes iOS hardware but also OS X hardware and also Ive's progress was more competitive while on software both MS and Google quickly caught up with Apple, if only not so fully.

What to expect next?

Shared time of Ive with software design means that probably Apple hardware design changes may somewhat slow down (specs will change of course), but there will be huge changes in software and the way it interacts with user. For example, the clock app icon may become live, mail icon more informative, weather icon live updating, stock app icon go live and so on, because Ive will require every icon to have some function, such as displaying information at glance and will never allow stale icons (=nonfunctional) in iOS.

Scott may have had Steve's abrasive style/personality, but it doesn't seem like he had his genius.

Just look at the iOS events. Everyone always comes out disappointed from those. Even the last iPhone 5 event, everyone marveled at the beauty of the phone (thanks to Ive), but they were disappointed in the lack of innovation on the iOS front. Don't get me wrong I still love iOS, but I haven't seen anything ground breaking in a while.

Compare that to apple's iPad mini event. Everyone came out of that in awe at all of the announcements, and all of the Apple VPs seemed genuinely excited about what they had to show us. That was an awesome event and you really had to come out of that excited.

Steve probably liked Scott because he reminded him of himself, but I don't think Scott ever had the vision that Steve had. Can you imagine scott Forstall leaving apple to create a brand new mobile OS that was better than anything else? I can't.

I would rather have Bob Mansfield over Scott Forstall any day. Just look at the unbelievable hardware he's been cramming into Ive's designs over that past several years.

I had a strong feeling that this was the case for bob. When you don't like working with someone, it definetly changes your attitude on if you want to stick around or not, especially when you have millions in the bank and tons of options to cash out on, retirement looks really good compared to working with a butthead.

I think Tim's removal of Forstall is going to be a good decision and direction for Apple.

Perhaps Tim Cook's theme is that since none of the executives left is Steve Jobs, he won't tolerate Steve Jobs-like egos.

^ This

Considering that Forstall was once referred to as mini-Steve, the rumors surrounding this shakeup do seem to suggest that with Steve gone, Tim Cook won't put up with any one person thinking he is more important than the company or the products.

Scott may have had Steve's abrasive style/personality, but it doesn't seem like he had his genius.

Just look at the iOS events. Everyone always comes out disappointed from those. Even the last iPhone 5 event, everyone marveled at the beauty of the phone (thanks to Ive), but they were disappointed in the lack of innovation on the iOS front. Don't get me wrong I still love iOS, but I haven't seen anything ground breaking in a while.

Compare that to apple's iPad mini event. Everyone came out of that in awe at all of the announcements, and all of the Apple VPs seemed genuinely excited about what they had to show us. That was an awesome event and you really had to come out of that excited.

Steve probably liked Scott because he reminded him of himself, but I don't think Scott ever had the vision that Steve had. Can you imagine scott Forstall leaving apple to create a brand new mobile OS that was better than anything else? I can't.

I would rather have Bob Mansfield over Scott Forstall any day. Just look at the unbelievable hardware he's been cramming into Ive's designs over that past several years.

Well, Forstall wouldn't be able to create iOS (still a best mobile OS) on both tablets and smartphones if he didn't have a vision. You see, in order to change the world, you have to know how its gonna look when you implement the changes. Having said that, with these huge achievements, Forstall may hit his limits as well. So he knew that his vision was right, that even Android and Samsung followed him, but the minimalist Windows Phone might expose weaker sides of iOS approach, which is not live information and Forstall didn't know how to make it. I guess he tried, hence the notifications and things like that, but its wasn't good enought to rule the world (it would be good enough to create a new world). All in all, probably Forstall himself is happy to go, since he's done so much for Apple already.